Stella. His baby sister who would steal him out of house and home given the chance. “I’ll call her tomorrow.”
Jenny took a glass down from the cabinet. She turned on the faucet and let the water run until it was cold. Charlie wondered when she had learned to do that. Babies didn’t come out knowing how to do anything but cry, shit, and sleep. Sue must’ve taught her. Or maybe she’d picked it up from watching. She was smart, his daughter. She had the world in front of her. She wasn’t like Charlie’s mother. She would have opportunities.
“Jenny?” Charlie waited for her to turn around. “You wanna go to college?”
She gave him that funny smile again. “Of course I do. I’m already taking courses at the junior college for credit.”
“You are?”
“Daddy, you pay for it.”
“I do?”
She laughed. “Silly, I’ve already been accepted to the University of Georgia. Remember when you gave me money for the application fee?”
Christ, no one told him anything. “I thought that was for ballet lessons.”
“You never listen to me. I haven’t taken ballet in years.” She kissed his head. “I think you need some sleep.”
“Wait a minute.” He stuck his hand in his jacket pocket—the one without the knife—and pulled out the ad from Cosmo magazine. “I wanted you to look at this.”
She unfolded the glossy page. “Max Factor?”
“Look at the model. See how she does her eyebrows?”
She stared at him like he was unbalanced, because that’s what all the women in his life did lately.
He said, “Even a pretty girl can do better, right? See how the model’s eye shadow is two-toned? I think you could do something like that and it’d be really nice.”
She nodded as she folded the ad back into a square. “Thanks, Dad. I’ll think about it.”
Charlie sat back in his chair as she left the room. That hadn’t gone as well as he’d thought it would. Then again, nothing was going well in his life lately.
Just like Melvin Finkelmeyer.
Six scotches in, Charlie should have been able to push the dead man from his mind, but the story the widow told him was haunting him.
The truth was, Charlie had thought the homeless guy was black the first time he’d seen him. He was standing in the street dressed like a black man, talking like a black man. Hell, he’d even called himself a black man.
Coward can’t handle takin’ on no homeless brother!
Outside the dry cleaner’s, Finkelmeyer still looked black. He sounded black. The knife even looked like something a black man would carry.
Add to that the fact that the man’s own wife, now his widow, had claimed that he’d turned into a black man. She’d kicked him out of their home for it. She’d alienated him from his children. She’d barely given him scraps from her table.
So Finkelmeyer thought he was cursed. What man wouldn’t? He’d killed himself to end it. Charlie wasn’t going to kill himself. He’d spent his entire life scrambling to survive. No way in hell he’d take his own life, no matter how bad it got.
Honestly, how bad was it, anyway?
Not bad. Charlie could deal with what was happening to him. So what if people were treating him like he was an idiot? So what if blood was coming out of his prick and he felt bloated all the time? So what if his chest was sore, and double so what if it wasn’t really his chest, but his nipples?
Sue’s laughter traveled down the stairs.
Charlie closed his eyes. Instantly, he saw Sue being fucked by Burt Reynolds. He was behind her. His hairy chest was rubbing against her naked back. He squeezed her breasts as he rammed into her. She could feel his breath on her neck. His tight balls slapping her ass. His fingers reached down and touched her between the legs and—
“Jesus Christ!” Charlie jumped up from the table so fast that the chair fell over.
“Charlie?” Sue called, worried.
“I’m—” Charlie had to clear his throat to bring his voice down a few octaves. “I’m fine.”
Hell yes, he was fine. He was hard as a fucking rock.
Charlie picked up the chair off the floor and righted it. He sat down with his legs wide apart. His pants were tented up like Ringling Brothers. He hadn’t been this hard in twenty years.
Charlie laughed. What a dumbass he was. That stupid Jewish slit had him thinking he was turning into a woman. He could say the words now, if only to himself. The widow claimed Melvin Finkelmeyer had turned into the very thing he hated most. Charlie didn’t hate women. As a matter of fact, Charlie loved women.
He laughed again. You didn’t see a woman walk around with a boner like this between her legs.
He shuddered at the thought.
And then he listened.
Sue was chuckling at something on TV. The floor creaked as Jenny walked from the bathroom back to her bedroom. He heard her door shut.
Slowly, Charlie unzipped his pants. He stared at his cock like it was a long-lost friend. Jesus, it was magnificent. Not as big as most, but he could do a lot with it. Charlie spit in his hand. He wrapped his fingers around the shaft. He gave it a gentle stroke.
His cock came off in his hand.
Literally.
His entire cock and balls unplugged from his body.
Charlie stared at his genitals. He raised them to eye level. He turned them upside down. There were two thick prongs like an electrical plug on the bottom.
He felt between his legs. Two sockets. Or maybe not two sockets. The one in back was definitely his asshole. Which meant the one in front …
Charlie thought about that for several minutes.
He licked his fingers and stuck them into his vagina. Charlie hadn’t put his face near one of those things in years, but the smell was familiar. He slowly pulled out his fingers and traced them up the inside of his slit.
“Shit!” he gasped.
Who the fuck knew that thing was there?
Charlie touched it again. An electric jolt went through his body. He played around, trying to get the touch just right. Oddly, lighter was better. He guessed that made sense. The little flap of skin was sensitive. Charlie remembered his girlfriend asking him to touch hers, but he didn’t have the patience. Put one of these on a man and he’d have all the patience in the world. Jesus Christ, it felt like a thousand butterflies giving him a blow job.
He closed his eyes as he touched himself. His tongue darted out between his teeth. His toes gripped at the floor. He thought about his girlfriend. Then he thought about his wife. He forced himself not to think about Burt Reynolds.
That guy probably knew where to put his fingers. Charlie probably would’ve too, if he’d had the time. He was always rushing around trying to work, trying to take care of his family. Shit, he should probably be at work right now. He still needed to process the paperwork on Commissioner Ballantine’s Cadillac. He needed to go back to the mall and get underwear. He’d take a hundred-dollar bill and shove it in Judy’s face. Let her tell Mabel about it over lunch. And he should probably get Jenny that Easter basket. College! Who knew his baby was going to college? She’d need all kinds of things. Sheets for her bed, posters for the walls, and he wasn’t going to send her to UGA without buying her a new wardrobe. How much was that going to cost? Charlie would have to talk to his sales team. The quotas were going to go up. They couldn’t coast anymore. Maybe he should fire some people to put the fear of God in the rest of them. Deacon should be the first one out the door. The way he had talked to Charlie today like he didn’t know his own mind.
Charlie realized his hand had stopped.
What the hell? He couldn’t concentrate long enough to diddle himself. Normally, he clocked out the minute his dick got hard, but now he felt overwhelmed with things he had to do. He needed to make a list.
Charlie stood up. He opened the junk drawer, but it was so messy he couldn’t find anything. Sue had left the supper dishes drying on the rack. He should probably put those aw
ay. Had she ironed his shirts yet? He couldn’t show up at Mike Thevis’s wearing a wrinkled shirt.
“Shit.” Charlie sat back down in the chair. This wasn’t him. What did he care about ironed shirts and clean dishes? He was a man.
He said the words, “I’m a man, goddamn it.”
Charlie grabbed his cock off the table. He crammed it into his vagina. It caught on the sides, but he breathed through the pain, shoving it up to his balls. He wriggled his hips. There was still some room in there. Charlie pushed harder, but apparently he had an unnaturally long vagina.
Charlie didn’t let this stop him. He fucked himself. First fast, then slow, then fast again, then slow. He pulled it out until the tip almost showed. He pushed it in until he felt the balls strain. Back and forth, fast and slow. He turned it different ways. He went upside down. More fast, more slow, until finally, he gave up.
Charlie stared at the dick in his hand.
Honestly, he didn’t see what all the fuss was about.
APRIL 8, 1974
Chapter Seven
The Braves hat was back on the chicken when Charlie walked onto the dealership floor. He wanted to let it go, but it grated like nothing else in his life. Charlie was running a business, not a nursery.
He raised his voice. “Who put this fucking hat back on the chicken?”
Everybody looked at him like he was insane.
Charlie screamed, “I asked who put this fucking hat on the chicken!”
“Hey, hey, brother.” Deacon put his hand on Charlie’s arm. “Let’s chill out, now. All right?”
Charlie threw off his brother’s hand. “Don’t tell me to chill out, you jackass.”
Deacon rubbed his hand like Charlie had slapped it. “I know you don’t care about sports, but it’s a big thing for a lot of guys. Hank versus the Babe. History in the making.” He winked at Charlie. “If they don’t shoot him first.”
“What if a customer walks through that door, sees that hat, then walks back out?” He snatched the hat off the chicken and threw it at Deacon.
Deacon missed the toss. “Jesus, Chuckles. No need to get hysterical.”
“I am not hysterical,” Charlie said, hearing the hysteria in his own voice. He tried to sound calm, but all he could manage was to hiss the words through his teeth. “I said don’t put the hat on the chicken.”
He turned on his heel and walked toward his office. He felt the heat of Deacon’s gaze on his back. Let him stare. Charlie didn’t give a shit. He was so tired of getting pushback on everything he said. Charlie made thousands of decisions every day. He didn’t have time to explain the reasons behind them. And he shouldn’t have to. This was his dealership. This was his company.
Charlie felt tears in his eyes. He was so angry that he felt his throat closing. He wanted to go back and scream at Deacon, but he knew how his brother worked. Somehow, he would manage to make it look like Charlie was the crazy one.
“Fuck it,” Charlie said. He pushed open the door to his office. He put his briefcase on the floor when what he really wanted to do was throw it through the window.
He stood in the middle of the room with his hands on his hips.
What fresh hell awaited him today? Going by Finkelmeyer, the whole fucking building would burn down. Let it burn, Charlie thought. And then he chastised himself for going to such a dark place. Deacon wasn’t his only employee. The guys in the back respected him. The porters never questioned Charlie’s decisions. They did what he said and were happy to take their paychecks.
“Am I interrupting?” Darla stood in his office doorway. “Just checking if you want some coffee. I just put on a fresh pot.”
“Sure.” Charlie started toward the door.
“I’ll get it.” Darla gave him a curious look. “You want a doughnut, too?”
“No thanks. I’m trying to watch my weight.” Charlie wiped his eyes as he walked over to his chair. He hoped Darla wasn’t going to tell the other secretaries that he’d been crying.
Charlie sat down at his desk. He looked around his office. Why had he ever thought this shithole made him look successful? All the furniture was chrome and leather, looking every bit of the discount Charlie got from the guy who sold it to him. The paneling on the walls was buckled. The framed photos of him with the old mayor, the new mayor, and any other dignitary who was willing to stand in front of a camera with him were kind of braggy. And his desk was huge. There was no point in having a desk this large. All it did was collect paperwork. And dust. Charlie ran his hand along the back edge. How much was he paying the cleaning crew? Why was it the only way a job got done right around here was if Charlie did it himself?
The phone on his desk rang. Charlie answered because Darla was busy getting his coffee. “Lam Auto Sales.”
“Mr. Lam?”
Charlie felt a pebble lodge in his throat. “Mr. Chop.”
“Going to the game tomorrow night?”
Charlie hesitated. This was off script. “If you think I should.”
“I heard about your altercation.”
Charlie sat up in his chair. He pictured Mike Thevis outside the kitchen window last night watching Charlie try to fuck himself.
“Finkelmeyer.” Thevis said the word like it left a bad taste in his mouth. “Fuckin’ coon. Who knew?”
Charlie knew, but he didn’t say.
“People hiding like that. Thinking they can pass. Makes me sick, you know.”
Charlie said nothing.
“Mr. Lam?”
“Yes, Mr. Chop?”
“You’re not hiding anything?”
Charlie felt his stomach drop. “No, sir.”
“Good,” Thevis said. “I’m sure it’ll be easier for you today.”
“Today?”
“When you go to pick up your suit.”
Charlie swallowed. Just the thought of going back to the dry cleaner’s made him feel like he was going to wet his pants. “Yes, sir. I’ll be there as soon as—”
There was a click on the other end of the line.
Charlie hung up the phone. Did Thevis know what was happening to Charlie? Did he know about the curse? The man ran all kinds of porn. The kiddie stuff at the widow’s house was just the tip of the iceberg. There was talk about snuff films. Bondage that went too far. Had Thevis set up Charlie for one of his sick movies?
Charlie gripped the arms of his chair. This was some kind of black voodoo magic that was working on him. If Thevis was involved, then Charlie was fucked more than he thought.
“You okay?” Darla stood with a cup of coffee in each hand.
Charlie felt sweat dripping under his breasts. “Is it hot in here?”
“It’s always hot.” Darla handed him one of the cups. “Your sister called. I said you were with a customer. Two of your brothers called. I should know them by now, but I couldn’t tell you their names.”
“I have that same problem.” He indicated the chair across from him. “Let’s talk.”
Darla sat on the edge of the chair. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No, of course not.” Charlie drank the coffee. She’d put in too much sugar, but he didn’t want to upset her so he drank some more.
She asked, “Do you want me to take dictation or—”
“How much do I pay you?”
“I’m not complaining if that’s—”
“I didn’t—”
They both laughed.
“I’m sorry,” Charlie said. “You go first.”
“I’m not complaining. I love my job. I need my job.”
“I know you do.” She had a photograph of a kid on her desk. A boy. Maybe ten years old. She didn’t wear a wedding ring. “You’re alone?”
“My husband died in Vietnam.”
Charlie nodded, though he didn’t have a frame of reference. “I’m sorry.”
“Well.” She shrugged, but her eyes were moist. “Anyway, if there’s ever anything you need. I mean … If you need me to show you how much I need my job. Bec
ause I do.”
Charlie held up his hand. Her voice was shaking. He thought about the cop who’d shown up at his girlfriend’s apartment the night of the stabbing.
My friends call me Jo.
Her breasts smothering his face. Her dirty hands roaming up and down his body. And then when he’d told her no, screamed at her that he didn’t want to, she had looked at Charlie like it was his fault for starting the whole thing.
Had he started the whole thing? Charlie kept playing it back in his head. He must have done something to set her off. She had commented on his suit. He liked the flattery. Maybe that had turned him flirty with her. He’d somehow signaled that it was okay by the way he was sitting or looking at her or tilting his head to the side. She didn’t just jump him out of the blue. So what had he done wrong? One minute, they were sitting and talking like two normal people, and the next minute she was on top of him. He could still taste the nicotine from where she had clamped her hand over his mouth.
“Mr. Lam?” Darla was still sitting on the edge of her seat.
“I’m giving you a raise in your next paycheck.”
“Oh.”
“You do a good job here. You deserve to be recognized for it. And stop calling me Mr. Lam. Call me Charlie like everybody else.”
There were tears in her eyes again. This time, she let them fall. “Thank you, Mr. Lam. Charlie.” She had a pretty laugh. It was contagious. Charlie laughed, too.
“Knock-knock,” Deacon said, but he was already in the room.
Darla got up to leave. Deacon blocked the doorway so she had to squeeze past him.
Charlie struggled to keep his tone even. “Don’t do that to her again.”
“Do what?” Deacon plopped down in the chair. “Christ, buddy, are you crying?”
Charlie wiped his eyes.
“You on the rag or something?”
“Ha-ha,” Charlie said, like that wasn’t even a remote possibility. “What do you want, Deacon? I’ve got work to do.”
“You don’t gotta be a bitch about it.”
“Don’t call me a bitch.”
“Oh, the lady’s sensitive.” Deacon put his feet up on Charlie’s desk. The wood was already scuffed where he’d done this a thousand times before. “Why are you staring at me like that?”
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